5016 classroom
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[edit] What else is going on in classrooms besides "learning lessons"?
I'm assuming in this response that "learning lessons" is a reference to the transmission of formal and curricular knowledge by the teacher and its reception by students.
"Education" in the sense of overcoming some sort of ignorance by means of interaction with others might be going on. Students might be conversing with friends about a certain anime character recently to embark on a perilous adventure. Or trying to figure out why the teacher looks so tired today (perhaps she's broken up with her boyfriend?). Maybe they're watching a group of birds hopping around the school garden, beyond the widow sill, pecking the ground at a very close distance from the building, much nearer today than normal.
As we have been discussing in class, these can be supremely educating and educative moments. In his article Mehan pays much attention to the structured give-and-take of student and teacher, and this is important. In many classrooms the unstructured interactions, not necessarily directly with the teacher but also with other students and the environment might also present significant points and moments for anthropological investigation and discovery.
Stephen Chemsak
[edit] What arguments could you make for the legitimacy of using the word "learning" for what Mehan is describing?
[edit] Should I have used the word "validity" rather than the word "legitimacy" in the preceding question? What difference does using either word make?
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